Saturday, June 8, 2024 @ 8:00pm – 9:30pm (EDT)
Saint John's In the Village, New York, NY, United States
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$20 in advance, $30 at the door

"The ages live in history through their anachronisms." – Oscar Wilde

On Saturday, June 8th Eastern at 8pm at St. John's In the Village, Composers Concordance presents "A Knack for Anachronism." For this event, composers are asked to write music with elements that defy chronology or are incongruous in the present, including surprising combinations of genres, timbres, and instruments, etc. These compositions will be performed by the Centuries Trio, which is in itself an anachronism. Formed to perform music of the past with the electric guitar playing the violin lines, the baroque cello da spalla playing the cello, and the piano keeping its own, the trio performs music of Mozart, Handel, Mendelssohn, as well as new works written for them. The ensemble will be joined by mezzo-soprano Sishel Claverie, composers Jay Elfenbein on electric viola da gamba and Sophie Dunér, voice as well as percussionist / tap dancer Max Pollak.

Featured compositions include Gene Pritsker's An Anachronistic Melody, Charles Coleman's Flurry, Jay Elfenbein's Mood Swing, Lynn Bechtold's Great Scott! What the Dickens!, Dan Cooper's Good Night, David Rothenberg's graphic score Three Paths to the Music of Nature, and Sophie Dunér's The City of My Dreams, plus Pritsker's arrangement of a transcription of Thelonious Monk's solo version of Tea For Two by Vincent Youmans.

The concert will also be live streamed on Composers Concordance's Facebook page.

About Composers Concordance

Staying in rotation for 40 years in NYC is a rare feat. In the case of a new music presenting organization, it requires not only diligence and cognizance of achievements of the past but also an ethic of keeping one's ear to the ground for emerging stylistic and technological developments, as well as talented new composers on the scene.

Composers Concordance, founded in 1984 by Joseph Pehrson and Patrick Hardish, advised by Otto Luening, strives to present contemporary music in innovative ways, with an emphasis on thematic programming. Directors Gene Pritsker and Dan Cooper co-curate the programs and lead the CompCord Ensemble, Chamber Orchestra, String Orchestra, and Big Band. Associate Directors are Milica Paranosic, Peter Jarvis, Debra Kaye, and Seth Boustead.

Composers Concordance has also created a Naxos-distributed record label: Composers Concordance Records, co-directed by Peter Jarvis. Composers Concordance's overriding vision is to promote contemporary music, composers, and new works as a rightful and respected part of society. Good music performed and recorded well, pushing the boundaries of sound and composition.

http://www.composersconcordance.com

About Gene Pritsker, guitar

Composer/musical polymath Gene Pritsker has written over nine hundred compositions, including chamber operas, orchestral and chamber works, electro-acoustic music and songs for hip-hop and rock ensembles. His compositions employ an eclectic spectrum of styles, that are influenced by his studies of various musical cultures.

He is the founder and leader of Sound Liberation, an eclectic hip hop-chamber-jazz-rock-etc. ensemble. He also Co-Directs Composers Concordance. Gene's music is performed all over the world at internationally recognized festivals and by highly respected ensembles and performers.

He co-founded the Grammy-nominated Absolute Ensemble with Kristjan Jarvi and has been a composer in residence and guitarist since its creation in 1993. He worked closely with jazz fusion legend Joe Zawinul and has orchestrated major Hollywood movies, including Cloud Atlas, for which he wrote additional music and composed his Cloud Atlas Symphony. He is also the lead orchestrator for such TV series as Babylon Berlin, Jett, Netflix's Sense8, and Messiah. Gene is the lead orchestrator and has additional music in the 2021 film The Matrix Resurrections.

"My music is extremely eclectic, for me music has no bounds – I view the world of music as one big genre. My motto for my art is ending the segregation of sound vibration."

Gene is also a guitarist/rapper/Di.J./ and producer he incorporates each of these musical attributes to create music that is "not designed for easy listening or to melt into the background. It is insistent. It demands attention and curiosity." (New York Newsday) "Mischief-maker and cultural blender-in-chief, Pritsker is a serious artist, yet much of his work is witty and irreverent. Anyone can draw a mustache on the Mona Lisa, but few musicians draw it as artistically and creatively as Gene Pritsker." (Raymond Tuttle, Fanfare Magazine)

https://www.genepritsker.com/

About Arthur "Artie" Dibble, cello da spalla

Arthur Dibble, Juilliard-trained violist and violinist is enjoying a wonderful free-lance musician's life in New York City. Diverse styles of music have taken him all over the world, from touring with Barbra Streisand, Led Zeppelin, various string quartets and the St. Louis Symphony to right here at home on the major stages of New York with orchestras, chamber groups, and Broadway stars. Arthur enjoys teaching and performing for the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Midori Foundation. You can often find him in recording studios during the day and Broadway show pits in the evenings or feeding his espresso obsession in a café.

https://www.newyorkcomposerscircle.org/performers/artie-dibble.html

About Sophie Dunér, voice

Sophie Dunér is a singer and composer with roots in jazz. Originally from Sweden, she travels and performs internationally as her blend of jazz, world, and contemporary classical writing receives demand worldwide – from the infamous CBGBs in NYC to Buenos Aires Festival de Música Contemporánea La Plata to Festival O/Modernt in Sweden.

http://www.sophieduner.com/

About Max Pollak, percussion & tap dance

http://mxpllk.com/

Saint John's In the Village

218 W 11th St
New York, NY 10014
United States

http://www.stjvny.org/
(212) 243-6192